


Kiss the Real Me

by withyoutiltheendofthelime



Category: Captain America (Movies), The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Bisexual Bucky Barnes, Bisexual Male Character, Bisexual Steve Rogers, Bisexuality, Bucky Barnes's Hair, Bucky Barnes's Metal Arm, First Time, Friends to Lovers, Hand Jobs, M/M, Mental Health Issues, Protective Natasha Romanov, Steve Rogers's Chest, Tony Stark Has Issues, Tony Stark has no boundaries, Virgin Steve Rogers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-09-20
Updated: 2016-09-20
Packaged: 2018-08-16 08:19:27
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,744
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8094859
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/withyoutiltheendofthelime/pseuds/withyoutiltheendofthelime
Summary: (It's two AM, and tonight Bucky's too afraid of remembering his sins to go to bed, so Steve is hanging out with him.)
Bucky nodded slowly. "I... I can't tell if HYDRA put this in my head."
Heat flooded Steve's face. "What do you mean?" Until that moment he had honestly thought Bucky was having That Conversation with him, the Your Best Friend Is Bi awkward chat, to distract himself from having to relive assassinating JFK, or some dignitary's family, or something. That he might actually be asking about this, for real reasons stopped Steve in his tracks.





	

When Steve got up to go to the bathroom at one forty-whatever he was a little too bleary to notice anything about the common area besides the TV being on and people awake. Aiming and washing his hands and all that woke him up, though, and when he stepped back out into the hallway he saw that Bucky was lounging on the sofa while Natasha rummaged around in the kitchen.

 

Curious, he joined them. "Can't sleep?"

 

Bucky ignored him, in his flickering blue trance, but Natasha beckoned him closer. When Steve was in the kitchen, she said in a low tone, "He won't go to sleep."

 

Steve exhaled. "Again."

 

"It's not like it makes it okay, but I can't really blame him." Natasha licked ice cream off a spoon, then tossed the spoon in the sink.

 

"Rules are rules."

 

"Yeah, and Tony owns the building," Natasha agreed. "If the rest of us are asleep..."

 

"Buck's gotta be locked in his room," Steve finished. "Yeah."

 

"But if he's having a bad night I'm sure that's the last thing he wants, and I know how he feels."

 

"By refusing to go in there, he's ensuring that you have to stay up." Steve frowned. "I'm sorry."

 

"I'm okay." Natasha opened the freezer. "I'm trying the rest of the Avengers' favorite ice creams, one at a time."

 

"Not double-dipping, I hope?"

 

"Calm down, Gallant." Natasha smirked and held up her other hand, showing a fistful of clean spoons.

 

"Gallant?"

 

"Goofus and Gallant? Never mind." Natasha looked over at Bucky, and Steve followed her glance. The television was airing some kind of infomercial about high-tech running shoes.

 

Steve walked back into the den and sat down beside Bucky. "Now, _look_  at what happened to the brand name shoe, after only a week of exercise!" said a perky woman on the screen.

 

"Think we should try out those shoes?" Steve asked casually.

 

Bucky wasn't in the mood for casual. He stood up with a pissy huff and stalked down the hallway toward the bedrooms.

 

"He's not in his room," Natasha commented with a spoon in her mouth.

 

Steve found Bucky in _his_  room, standing facing away from the door--probably because this wasn't one of the rooms that could be locked from the outside. Bucky, ever the soldier, must have heard him come in because he let out a loud and exasperated breath at Steve's entrance.

 

"Hey, look, I know--" Steve began.

 

Bucky whirled around angrily. "Lay off me!"

 

Steve let four even breaths pass, in and out. That seemed to calm Bucky a little. "You need some help?"

 

Bucky sighed and looked down. "I know the rules, and I know why you have to put me in there. I just -- sometimes being alone is torture. I couldn't make myself go in there and shut the door. Even though I knew I was keeping Natasha up. I'm a jerk."

 

"It's okay, Buck, I get nightmares too."

 

Bucky raised his head and met his eyes with an intense glare. "It's not nightmares. I figure I deserve those. It's those moments before I fall asleep. I've got memories I sure as hell know you don't."

 

"Oh, Buck...." Steve took a step closer and squeezed Bucky's upper right arm.

 

"I don't like falling asleep with those moments ringing in my ears. And I guess I'm a big enough jerk to ruin everyone else's night avoiding it."

 

Steve didn't know what else to do besides nod. "I get it."

 

Bucky's words came out after pauses. "I should have... I was too dangerous. I should've found a way to--"

 

"You did good in the world before all that," said Steve, "and you will again."

 

Bucky nodded lowly, heavy-lidded. "I just need to stop being a royal pain in the dick to the rest of you and live through the night first."

 

Steve rapidly ran through his options as he stifled a yawn. "What about me? What if I was in there with you, behind the lock?"

 

Bucky's face froze. "Steve, you could--I could kill you in your sleep. In _my_  sleep. Without either of us knowing it."

 

"You won't." Steve wasn't sure if he really believed that with his head, but his heart sure did.

 

Bucky could probably tell he was lying a little, that Steve _did_  have doubts but he was willing to overlook them to be there for someone who needed him. "You'd really do that for me?"

 

"Sure, it'll be fun! I think the kids call it a sleepover. Or like during the war."

 

"Those days," Bucky agreed wistfully. "You sure you're okay bunking with this?" He held up his left hand, the light picking that moment to glint off of it at just the right angle to sting Steve's eye.

 

"It won't be that shiny when I'm sleeping, right?" Steve quipped, frantically trying to break the tension.

 

"Ha," Bucky laughed, and Steve's heart swelled with relief. Bucky poked Steve in the ribs. "Okay, sure, let's go. You did say you were queer in this century; guess you must be pretty desperate to get a man to take you home."

 

Steve flashed him an awkward smile and looked away, not sure how to take that one. Bucky must be feeling better if he was back to the rank-outs and put-downs Steve remembered from the old days. They hadn't really talked about this yet, but Steve figured if That Conversation was enough to distract Bucky from his demons until he passed out from sheer exhaustion, then he was now and officially up for it.

 

Greeeeat.

 

Natasha met them in the hallway. "Everything okay?"

 

"Yeah," said Steve, running his hand through his hair. "I'm spending the night in Bucky's room."

 

She sized him up, saying lots with her eyes. "You need anything?" _Are you sure that's a good idea? If you wake up dead am I supposed to kill him? Should I be okay with this?_  


"Nah..." Steve tried to play it casual. "Thanks."

 

"Sorry," called Bucky's voice from already inside his room.

 

"Yeah," Natasha answered. "I've been there."

 

Bucky was in his own bathroom--he got one because of having to be locked in--so Steve sat down on the bed and looked around. The walls were full of images Pepper Potts thought were "calming" -- a glacial lake, a vineyard, a conch resting on a white beach.

 

"I'm locking the door now," said Natasha.

 

"Yeah," said Steve. "Night. JARVIS, lights to forty percent."

 

When Bucky got out he sat down beside Steve on the bed. Neither of them spoke for a few moments.

 

"So what's it like to kiss a guy?" Bucky asked.

 

Steve's face flushed. "Actually, I don't know yet."

 

"Really?" Bucky interrupted.

 

"It's not like I've even kissed that many _girls_ ," Steve protested. "When we were kids, some of those girls you set me up with let me kiss them, or kissed me first, but most of them weren't interested in a little guy."

 

"Sorry," said Bucky.

 

"Nah." Steve waved it off. "The showgirls -- they were pretty nice to me. I think they kissed me more than I kissed them, but it was still fun. And of course... Peggy."

 

They said her name together.

 

"You would'a married her," Bucky pointed out. "She know about the guy thing?"

 

Steve nodded. "She was special. And then, when I woke up... yeah, sure, I tried, but she was still alive. I barely had time to meet girls I wanted to kiss, let alone figure out guys."

 

Bucky nodded slowly. "I... I can't tell if HYDRA put this in my head."

 

Heat flooded Steve's face. "What do you mean?" Until that moment he had honestly thought Bucky was having That Conversation with him, the Your Best Friend Is Bi awkward chat, to distract himself from having to relive assassinating JFK, or some dignitary's family, or something. That he might actually _be asking about this, for real reasons_  stopped Steve in his tracks.

 

"I." Bucky was looking all over the room except at Steve, then stopped being a chickenshit. Steve now felt the full force of those eyes boring into him. "I was never like this before you rescued me from Zola. They'd already been messing with me, experimenting--you know that. Otherwise I couldn't have survived falling from the train. _Don't_ ," he added, flinging up his hand to stay Steve's guilty apologies. "So I can't tell if it's really me or not. I'm sorry."

 

Steve was still stuck on the part about _before you rescued me_. "When I rescued you--"

 

"Yeah," said Bucky. "That first time. I woke up and there you were, in that new... wonderbod. I don't know. I don't know if they put that in my head, or if... they didn't. I mean, you felt like that before the serum, right? I'm not wrong?"

 

Was this _really happening?_  Steve nodded slowly. "Yeah, I always felt like this. I wouldn't have admitted it back then. In my, uh, fantasies at that age the idea was that it was for the girl. You and I were with a girl, and she asked us to, um."

 

"There's Natasha," Bucky suggested. "We could--"

 

"No, I don't actually--need that kind of a crutch anymore. I know it's okay now," said Steve. "Plus, I like having her as a different type of family, not--not that. Wait, are you saying when I rescued you--"

 

"You looked like a _Greek god_ ," Bucky protested. "What was I supposed to do? Only, I don't know, maybe it wasn't me."

 

"So you never said anything." Steve could almost _feel_  the stunned expression smeared on his face.

 

"So I never said anything. See what I mean? It made sense either way."

 

"What about after?"

 

"After what?"

 

"After you." Steve swallowed. "Fell."

 

Bucky shrugged. "Not much time in my own mind to notice that I was even alive."

 

"But you had a thing with Natasha."

 

"Yeah."

 

"Just Natasha?"

 

"Just her. That wasn't supposed to happen, anyway."

 

"But no more guys."

 

Bucky shook his head. "That's another reason I don't trust it. If I was... if I was like you, wouldn't I be all over Thor or even Clint or something? They've got muscles like yours."

 

"What happens if you think about Clint?"

 

"I think he's a little shit."

 

"He's a good guy," Steve interjected.

 

"Yeah, I know. I didn't mean he was a bad person."

 

"Maybe you could be like me but less so," Steve suggested.

 

"Or maybe for some _strategic reason_ ," Bucky scratched the back of his head roughly, "they planted this. I can't tell."

 

"What if they did?"

 

Bucky blinked. "Then it's just more violation."

 

Steve nodded solemnly and was silent for a moment. "You really--when I rescued you--"

 

"I thought they'd messed me up."

 

"You're not messed up," Steve insisted. Bucky lifted both eyebrows and Steve rushed to clarify. " _That's_ not messed up. I promise."

 

"I didn't mean to--" Bucky caught himself. " _You're_  not mess--"

 

Steve held up his hand. "It's fine. This all takes some getting used to."

 

"Yeah," said Bucky, his hand against the back of his neck. "It does. Do you still...?"

 

Steve lifted both eyebrows sadly. "You really have to ask that?"

 

Bucky inhaled the silence for a moment. "I don't deserve it."

 

"Well, I don't agree."

 

"I'm a land mine."

 

"You could be _my_  land mine." Steve gazed across the bed at him with sincerity. "I'll step as lightly as you need me to step."

 

"You've really never kissed a guy before?"

 

Steve thought he saw a hint of the old Bucky--no, he refused to think of it that way, because any _joie di vivre_ he saw wasn't the old Bucky, but a part of the new Bucky, the present Bucky, and he didn't want to deny him that recognition--in the sly lilt of these words. "Never."

 

"So I'd be the first?" That would be Bucky finding his ego and feebly using it to throttle his guilt from underneath.

 

"Yes, you would be my first."

 

"Better make it a good one, then," Bucky murmured as he silently lunged forward, catlike, no, assassinlike, and tilted his face counter to Steve's.

 

His first kiss was quick and hesitant, but he followed it by planting his lips on Steve's, open-mouthed. Steve, drowning in relief, kissed him back worshipfully; each time he thought Bucky was going to end the kiss it renewed, and the next thing he knew a metal hand was buried in his hair, stroking his ear.

 

Bucky writhed, broke the kiss, rested his head on Steve's shoulder. "I think I love you but I need to stop; I'm confused. I don't know what's me and what's HYDRA."

 

Steve nodded. "However you feel safe."

 

"It felt good," Bucky admitted. " _Real_  good. Like... I could... yeah. But I keep thinking of the first time that happened, back in the war..." He looked around the room, at everything but Steve. "Can you just hold me while I sleep?"

 

"Sure, yeah." Steve felt like he'd died and gone to heaven, or like some backwards version of Wanda was showing him an unrealistically beautiful dream of a future. His Bucky was asking  _to be held_. He couldn't even explain why this pleased him so much. Who cared?

 

"JARVIS," Bucky called out lazily from under the covers. "Lights to four percent."

 

Steve snuggled up next to his right side and they became a net of muscles, wrapped in each other's warmth. "This is nice."

 

"Yeah," said Bucky. "You should get on my left side. This arm's gonna fall asleep."

 

Steve chuckled. "We found another plus for your arm--you solved the eternal cuddling dilemma. Believe it or not, there are comics about this on the internet." He propped himself up on his own arms and began to roll over Bucky to get to his left side.

 

He didn't make it all the way there. Halfway to the left side of Bucky was the _front_  of Bucky, and as soon as he reached that, Bucky suddenly groaned, holding him in place with both hands. "What?"

 

"Oh," Bucky gasped in a rumbly garbage-truck of a voice. "Fuck HYDRA. This is so not HYDRA."

 

"Oh," said Steve, understanding.

 

" _Oh, God, Steve_ ," was Bucky's response. "This is me. This is really me. You gotta--you gotta... stay there." His body rolled against Steve's like an ocean wave, the soft parts together with the very, very hard parts. Oh, _Bucky_.

 

"I've got you," said Steve. "I'm not going anywhere."

 

"Can I see you?"

 

"What do you mean?"

 

"I wanna see... this." Bucky's right hand tapped Steve's chest, sending darts of heat from Steve's skin straight to his groin. "Like that first time."

 

"JARVIS, lights to twenty percent." Steve whipped his shirt over his head and let it fall somewhere.

 

" _Fuck..._ " Bucky's wide eyes shone in the darkness like jewels. His hands appeared from within the blankets and gripped Steve's hips. "What can I touch?"

 

"Anything you want," said Steve.

 

Bucky's metal left hand gripped Steve's ass as his right hand snaked between them. He was apparently moving right in for the kill, a thought which Steve quickly dismissed as being tasteless semantics, considering. Steve felt strong fingers enclose around his erection, and his eyelids sagged slightly.

 

"Whaddya know," Bucky drawled, "looks like I'm holding America's dick."

 

"Florida," Steve blurted.

 

"What?"

 

"Nothing... Joke I heard Tony make when he was making a business deal in Orlando."

 

"I love how you can be this two hundred pound muscle machine but still have the same embarrassed smile from when you were half my size." Bucky gazed up at him, enraptured, which only made Steve blush harder. And then Bucky started jerking him earnest which made Steve stop thinking entirely.

 

"What do you wa--" Steve began to ask.

 

" _This._ "

 

"You want me to--"

 

"Yeah."

 

They jerked each other under the blankets for a few moments, growing sweatier and happier and with Steve feeling more contented than he ever thought he'd feel again. "Can you do me like this?" Bucky asked at one point, demonstrating.

 

Steve responded.

 

  
_"Oh_ , yeah," Bucky muttered. He began to grunt, and then finally arched against Steve as if he were breaking down a door. " _Fuck!_ " he shouted, and Steve felt sticky warmth coat his fingers and his thigh.

 

Footsteps thumped in the hallway and Natasha's voice came from beyond the door -- "Anybody dead in there?" She sounded like she was trying to be light and casual but both men recognized the unmistakeable edge.

 

"I'm fine," Steve gasped, fucking turned on. He wanted to burrow into Bucky's sweat and rut against him.

 

"Okay," Natasha called suspiciously.

 

"Bucky stubbed his toe," Steve stammered at the same time Bucky yelled, "It's just sex."

 

"...Right," Natasha called after a pause.

 

Steve chuckled. "Thank goodness that wasn't Clint out there."

 

"Or it'd be all over the tower by breakfast that I stubbed my toe while fucking you, or something." Bucky kneaded Steve's thigh. "Hey. What if I wanted to suck you off?"

 

"America's dick?" Steve joked shyly.

 

"You're never gonna forget that, are you? Here," Bucky maneuvered his body. "Get on the bed."

 

Steve laid back against the pillow with his knees bent and his dick straight out, reaching. Bucky bent down over his dick. "Fuckin' _hair_." He moved his bangs out of the way and they tickled Steve's thighs, sending him wriggling.

 

"Here, put this in your mouth." Bucky jabbed gently at Steve's face with his metal hand. "If you make noise Natasha will come back, and this hand'll hurt less if you wind up biting me."

 

"I... bite?" Steve asked, confused. The metal hand was coldish but more pliable than he would have expected.

 

"If I do this right you might," said Bucky saucily. Old Bucky--new Bucky. His tongue lapped a trail down Steve's body and then 

 

" _Ohhh....._ " Steve moaned before he remembered to close his lips around Bucky's fingers.

 

Bucky's warm hot mouth worked magic and turned Steve's brain to syrup. He didn't want it to be over so quickly but it was _too good_  and, with a squeeze on Bucky's shoulder to warn him, Steve was soon was swallowing muffled moans around Bucky's fingertips as he climaxed.

 

They held each other in a sticky embrace, half clothed, half debauched. "Thank you," said Steve, because it seemed appropriate.

 

Bucky burst out laughing. "Caaaaaaptain fucking America. You're welcome, dipshit."

 

"I need to learn how to do that."

  
"You'd _better_ ," Bucky joked.

 

They passed out quickly after that, Steve curled up on Bucky's _left_  arm, which couldn't fall asleep.

 

✰

 

When Steve woke up in the morning, the other side of the bed was empty. He panicked for a moment before he realized Bucky was locked in, so he couldn't have left without one of the other Avengers letting them out. Nope, he was just in the bathroom--and here he was, coming out now.

 

"Hey," said Steve.

 

"Hey." Bucky sat down on the bed. "So I guess you were right, I'm bi too."

 

"We can get matching shirts," Steve said, internally kicking himself for sounding so silly.

 

"Remember what I was saying last night about Clint and Thor?" Bucky asked. "I realized... that my examples, well, I never said, why am I not attracted to Tony\--"

 

"I think you've had enough punishment for one lifetime," Steve interjected.

 

"Point. Or Scott the big-little guy or whoever. It was always, 'well, I don't fantasize about Clint and Thor.' Except, I kept going back to those two as my example. See what I'm saying?"

 

"You mean the fact that you were consistent in the guys you kept using as your test subjects means on some level--"

 

"Yeah," Bucky interrupted. "Not that I really want to. Like I said, Clint is a little shit, and Thor..." Bucky waved his hand dismissively. "But you--I know you. I... I _love_  you. I always have. It just took a supersoldier chest to connect my heart to my dick, or something."

 

"That's real poetic, Buck," Steve smirked.

 

✰

 

The other Avengers were already at the breakfast table by the time Steve and Bucky arrived. Steve helped himself to a huge plate of oatmeal and a banana while he quickly fried an egg over easy.

 

"I don't care how much money you have," Sam was saying to Tony, "it's still gross to eat loaded cheesy fries for breakfast. What is that?" he added, gesturing.

 

"Chorizo," said Tony, his mouth full.

 

"I dunno, it sounds kinda good," said Natasha.

 

"You want?" Tony offered. "Seriously, everyone's different, and this is perfect for me right now. I've got this, you've got your--whatever that is--"

 

" _Kakaós csiga_ ," said Wanda through her pastry. "Means chocolate snail."

 

"Okay, whatever," Tony continued with raised eyes. "That's a mental image I didn't need--"

 

"It's not actually a--" Natasha started in an exasperated tone.

 

"Right, right." Tony waved his hand. "And Mr. All-American milk-fed virgin over here has his oatmeal and healthy bits of fruit."

 

Steve reddened and accidentally inhaled some of the aforementioned oatmeal.

 

Bucky chuckled. "What? Steve's not a virgin."

 

"See, now, that's where you're wrong." Tony gestured with a forkful covered in egg-smeared chorizo, which everyone else eyed suspiciously in case the food went airborne.

 

Bucky gripped his coffee cup. "No, seriously--"

 

"We had some bonding conversations before you got here," Tony explained. "While you were off plugging world leaders there was plenty of time for Avengers heart-to-hearts. And don't you tell me Steve Rogers tells lies, Buckyball. I just wouldn't believe it."

 

Bucky started to say, "He wasn't--"

 

"Nothing wrong with being a virgin," Tony continued while he ate. "These are liberated times. The sex you have or don't have doesn't determine how anyone should treat you. We love him just the way he is, and maybe someday--"

 

"Hey, Iron Pill." Bucky's voice cut forcefully through the chatter. "He wasn't lying before, but he's not a virgin."

 

  
Tony looked at Steve.

 

"As of uh, five hours ago," Steve verified, feeling like his face was a griddle ready to fry everybody more eggs.

 

"All right!" Tony nodded appreciatively. "Our baby boy is growing up! Who's the lucky..." He looked around and must finally have noticed the shit-eating grins on both Bucky and Steve. "...uh...deadly assassin... Oh, God, I'll start over." He pretended to stand up with his plate of food and then placed it down again and re-sat. "Good morning, everyone." He paused. "Wow."

 

" _Anyway_ ," said Natasha.

 

Steve forgave Tony within seconds. It was, after all, a good morning.

 

 

✰ ✰ ✰ ✰ ✰ ✰ ✰


End file.
